Press and daily Dakotaian. (Yankton, Dakota Territory [S.D.]) 1880-1889, 1887-12-12
WORLD MAKING

WIZ Something OF Absorbing Inter.
est About World observation-disclosures
r. Lsiana's Lecture saturday Nsght
In the College Course.
The superior quality Of q public leo.
ture is upquestioned when the audience
carries it all away and makes it the
leading theme of conversation and dis
cussion when two or more Of them
are gathered together. Mr.. Leland's
Saturday night listeners are so fall Of
his teschings that they have not yet
ceased TO make them the leading topic,
and his way Of making and destroying
worlds has firmly fastened itself upon
popular appreciation. To the majority
of listeners a scientific theme is dry and
uninteresting and when it was announced
that Samuel P. LELAND would open che
winter college course with World Max
ing and il was known that he was to I'd.
vance . theory upon the manufacture OF
the hosts OF the ornament there ives
popular doubt as to whether it wal to
be- an evening Of entertainment or in
sipidi:y.
Bat Mr.. Leland's "World Making
was 30 full Of the meat and marrow oil
entertaining information that the
audience gave to him rApt attention
through ~a'diseourse two end o half hours
long and was not then satiated. There
was something new and good ell the
time and it would be difficult indeed to
place . more popular lecture or lecturer
before the public. The earth We inhabit
and lts companions Of chr solar system,-
the sum- Mercury, Venus. the asteroids,
Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and
Neptune were built up in the presence
of the audience, year by year. century
by century, age by sge. From the solar
system the lecturer reached ous into
|spaoe and grouped the stellar and astral
systems ami paused with Herschell at the
verge Of the sidereal heavens until @
larger telescope was constructed and
then penetrated the mysteries of that
fer away beyond. Herschell had reach
ed ten hundred mliiiou billion miles into
space and the Ross Telescope took him
yet fe4thar into lnfinlty. The subject
was %bewildering in its ~immensity. Oar
ew9n soIar system with its sun and its
eight planets and their satellites and
400 asteroids we're the merest frag-
ment Of the whole-embraclne ninety
thousand known solar systems, leaving
only conjecture to say how many are
unknown.
The startling portion Of the imforma-
ton advanced by Mr. Leland was his
announcements that our earth is dying.
Its life is ITS internal heat and ita fires
are %subsiding. The crRst OF the earth 10
s%hickening and as it becomes thicker
frigidity prevails and animal and veget-
able life is destroyed. The thickening
process began at the poles, advancing
from two directions towards the equator.
Already the arctica are next to t,nin-
habitabie. In time all vitality vii.
crowded to the tropics. Then the
tropics will freeze and will perish and
the earth will be dead. sBy actual OBJ
s~eryation the progress Of this
change is known and the worlds
greatest scientific mathematioians assert
that probably in 1900 years and pos
lively in 2 100 years every thing upon
this earth and the earth itself will be
dead frozen to death, and then, after q
dreary lapse, this earth will fall into che
sun and be consumed. This will happen
probably in 1900 years, positively in
$4,000 years. There is no lodging the
result-it must come, and Dakota may
never be = state.
Mr.. Leland asserted that Mercury and
Venus, the two planets between the
earth and the sun. are already dead.
The esrth's turn comes next and
then Mars, Jupiter Saturn and
che rest will follow. Mercury
will frst fall into the sun and its re.
moyai ia liable to cause Disturbances Of
equilibrium. Venus will nsxt take the
fiery plunge and then our earth must
prepare TO go.
The theory OF planetary existence il
that the members Of one solar system
were first thrown off from it's sun, blaz-
ing globes Of FIRE. They cooled, harden
ed, were prepared by the processes Of
ages FOR habitatIon. became inhabited
and in time will grow cold, become de.
populated, desolated, 60 back to thu
Gun, and become fused Worlds are
are again thrown off from the sun and
the process repeated. Thus it goes or
forever. Mr.. LELAND stated it ss q scien
tito fact that solar systems were contin
ually being consumed within range Of
the astronomers gage and ours could bs
no exception to the general rule. i
being clearly established that we must
60 that way, the felicitous part of th,
arrangement is its long postponemeDs.
We cannot follow Mr.. Leland's ed.
mirable lecture in detail. Jt was ful
of just such information aa We hav,
briefly sketched, conoisely presented
and interluded with bursts Of elcquence
humor and pathos.
The next lecture OK the course will b
given by William Parsons, some tim,
next month. ..Micheai Angelo will b
his topic. Mr.. Parsons was on the sc
winter oours and will be heard BY 81
vino heard him then. For the balanc
Of the course tickets will be sold 10